Mr. Matt

Hi Y.T, Yes, I know putting it in a duffle bag was a roll of the dice however, I didn't have much choice that late at night and flying out the next morning. I am very fortunate that was the only damage. I was sweating bricks the entire flight back to the US. I even canceled my connecting flight in NYC and rented a car to drive the 7 hours the rest of the way home because I didn't want to risk damage being transferred between planes

Hello all, To be upfront with you I must disclose that the only reason I joined this forum is because I am in need of help and am hoping someone here might be either able to or knows someone that can. Let me explain: I live in Rochester, NY area (between Buffalo and Syracuse) and was in France a couple weeks ago. At an antique fair I came across a wooden model of La Superbe. I collect 17th and 18th and 19th century nautical antiques and had to have it for my collection because I personally could never build anything like it. It was not delivered to my hotel until 5:30 on a Friday night and I flew out on Saturday morning. No time to take it to a packaging store so I scrambled to find what I could at local bazars. I ended up with a large duffle bag (yes, a duffle bag) and lots of packing. I did a damn good job packing it up, but it is still in a duffle bag. So, at the airport I explained the delicate nature of the contents of the bag to the ticket agent who in turn got her supervisor involved, who in turn got the ground crew supervisor involved and hand carried it to the plane and into the cargo hold. WOW. Unfortunately, when it arrived, the jibboom had broken. I have reached out to several model clubs around the area to see if anyone of their members could make the repair or point me in a direction. Crickets... Now I'm getting desperate to find anyone with the skillset to save this ship. I am willing to deliver it anywhere within a few hundred miles. Please reach out to me via email at mwe056@msn.com if you can repair it or know someone that could potentially. Thank you very much for reading-Matt